About
Searching Manuscript Collections

The
Library of Congress provides a Web interface for searching archival and manuscript cataloging in OCLC WorldCat. This
service is provided free-of-charge.
NUCMC staff can assist you with problems you might be
having searching WorldCat,
but we cannot perform searches for you.

The Library of Congress only provides search access to the following
materials in OCLC WorldCat: archival and manuscript
collections; mixed materials (i.e., collections that contain two
or more different types of bibliographic materials); and bibliographic
materials that have been described using archival descriptive rules.
The Library does not provide "free" access to search
books or other types of materials in WorldCat.

Definitions used in seaching the databases

OCLC
A
nonprofit membership organization serving 41,000 libraries in
82 countries and territories around the world.

Z39.50
An information retrieval protocol that supports
communication among different information systems. The maintenance
agency for the protocol is the Library of Congress. From the
NUCMC web site, it offers you seamless searching of OCLC WorldCat.

Gateway
The gateway to OCLC WorldCat using Z39.50 is an
easy access method which avoids having to
use OCLC'ssearching
forms and methods.

Left-anchored search
The search must begin
with the first significant word in a name, title, or subject
field, and continue with the search
in exact order, as opposed to "word list" search where the words
can be in any order.